Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1887-12-15
KRELL'S JOHN.


January is the dreariest, down by the sea;
being synonymous with high gales and
deluges of rain, alternated by snow-squalls
and bitter, freezing cold. Lucky the
fisher who has been sufficiently forehand
ed to allow himself holiday during that
time. Better to doze by the humblest
Preside, though the good wife scolds and
the babies cry, than riding the winter
waves, stung by the snow-bees and numb
ed by the wind, with more than likely
only frozen noze or fingers TO pay for
the toll.
If any marines were awake to this in
disputable fact, the Stormhaven fishers
certainly were, for as January IS the
dreariest month, SO Stormhaven was the
dreariest place in which to spend it. A
poor, brow beaten little settlement, whose
sole boast was more wrecks and drowned
men than any neighboring village.
Shaken by the gales and lashed by the
waves, it bore forlorn aspect of fright,
as not knowing in which quarter to look
for safety. The houses, built for protec-
ton from the wind, faced all points of
the com pass, and the streets in turn fol-
lowed the cratic example of the dwell
ings; which, though undoubtedly conven-
lent, was scarcely according to a survey
VI lu0d VI Doduby. III ldCb, Oh Inc ullu-
est summer day, Stormhaven was not
inviting in appearance; and now, in
sputtering, angry snow-gust, which chased
the waves topping over each other to-
wards shore, it looked like some deserted
village of the polar regions, rather than
the respectable Atlantic town it claimed
to be on the map.
Some signs of human life were visible
on the beach, however, in the shape of
four men engaged IL launching fishing
boat, regardless of the driving flakes.
Anything but cheerful party apparent
ly. three of the number wearing scowls
varying in intensity from mild perplex-
ity to deepest wrath while the fourth and
youngest concealed his brow, aud conse-
quently his feelings, beneath an oil skin
cap drawn low over his eyes.
In silence and gloom the quartetto
worked on until the preplexed members
feelings overcame him. He was a mild
featured giant in a faded pea-jacket,
( whose pockets he nervously explored as
he spoke.
"Ef wot we sed las night, Krell, causes
you ter go, in course we'd ha' taken it
back he slowly volunteered, but his
right-hand companion snapped him up
before the words fairly left his mouth.
'Speak fer Yerself, young feller,"
growled the second speaker, with dignity.
EFF Trinity Krell IL hankerin' fer friz
nose, let him get it, SEE [. Eff man is
gump enuff to put off en- SIGH sturm
ies' fer a few words, let him go, seq T.!
Wot's sed en- joke sh'd be took en- joke,
an eff a man makes arnest of If, faint
my fault. nor yours nuther."
John Krell said nothing. He had
proven the golden value of silence from
experience.
Moreover his father and himself were
alone to make the voyage, he preferred
suffering a frozen noze peacefully, rather
than bringing down the parental walls of
wrath to no purpose.
Most Of the Stormhaven residents con-
sidered "KrelPs John" as rather weak
minded in giving way to his fathers Cd
dities as he did; forbearance and sub
mission being nothing short of an imbe-
becility, to their vigorous understandings.
At "a one should have will of his own,
if he ever expected to possess such a
thing, and surely man of no spirit is a
poor creature.
But Kreli's John persisted on his tran
gull way, needless of criticism or advice.
He had a great reverence for the fifth
commandment, and still greater horror
ofEfamily disturbances.
The most convincing arguments in the
world would rebound Intellectually from
the chain armor of his fatherss Obstinacy,
so wherefore waste breath?
On one opinion alone he remained firm
IN spite of threats, sneers, and stormings.
That opinion, naturally, was the identical
one of all others that he shouldn't have
held, and the subject of it was s'Widder
Durant's Hapnah."
Hannah was pretty, and Hannah was
poor; and browning crime of all, her faith
er had never caught a fish in his life, be-
ing city clerk. who, years before, carried
off the beauty of the coast as his wife, on
ly at his death to send her back broken in
fortune, health and spirit. Of course, the
aforementioned virtue could net outweigh,
the latter sins; and likewise, of course, she
and Krell's meek, dreamy John mast need
fall in love.
Now worldly pride has lodgiag even in
a fisherman's breast, StOrmhaven fisher
man at that, and Timothy Krell was by no
means pleased with the daughter his son
proposed to present him.
He could lay claim to more of the ex-
cee0inely undesirable real estate of Storm
haven than any other man of the place;
gossip limited that he had at least $4,000
boarded up in bank; and lastly and most
overwhelming, he could trace his ancestors
away back into the misty shades of the
seventeenth century.
ssAn' every man o. them follered the
Waterr'he was wont TO conclude. with final
bang of the fist on the store-counter, after
holding forth on his genealogy to an awe
struck circle at BENEFITS.
Poor Hannah! She would fly like the
foam of the sea before the west wind
when she saw her prospective father-in-
law loom up in the distance. She was a
timid little maid, with frightened, fawn-
like eyes and the life Of solitude she led
with her sorrowful mother did not tend
to make her more courageous; but she
would have braved almost anything for
her J ohm, always and ever excepting Tim
othy. On the morning of the fishlng-
trip she dared even that. John was busy
with the fishing tackle, when the CLEAN of